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 A HISTORY OF LONDON to renounce the Solemn League and Covenant, to take the Oath of Supremacy and an oath of non-resistance, and within a year before election to have received the Lord's Supper according to the ritual of the Church of England." A Bill was also proceeded with ' for the Uniformity of Public Prayers and Administration of the Sacraments.' Most of the Puritans had favoured, and many of them actively pro- moted the Restoration ; and the Court party had carefully fostered hopes of comprehension or accommodation, at first, perhaps, not quite insincerely." The king had promised that the Prayer Book should be revised by a joint Commission of Episcopalians and Presbyterians, which accordingly met at the Savoy from 15 April to 25 July 1661." But the bishops had resolved beforehand that no material concessions should be made to the opposite party, and the revised book was in some respects more offensive to the Puritans than the older recension.^' The Act of Uniformity, as finally passed on 19 May 1662, not only enforced the universal and exclusive use of the revised book in public worship, but required all ministers publicly to declare their ' un- feigned assent and consent to all and everything contained and prescribed * therein, on pain of ejectment from office and benefice on 24 August.^* The total number of ministers evicted or silenced by this Act is variously estimated at from 1,200 to 2,000, exclusive of those previously ousted from sequestered benefices. On 27 August several of the City ministers presented a petition to the king 'that of your princely wisdom and compassion you would take some effisctual course that we may be continued in the exercise of our ministry.' ^^ The petition was considered in Council next day, and was favoured by the king, who ' intended an indulgence if it were at all feasible.' But his good intentions were overborne by Bishop Sheldon, who urged that ' if the sacred authority of this law be now suspended, it would make the legislature ridiculous and contemptible. . . and neither Church nor State could ever be free from distractions.' The London ministers ejected by the Act of Uniformity were fifty-five in the City, four in Westminster, six in Southwark, and six within the Bills of Mortality, including incumbents, lecturers, and assistants. There were also fifteen occasional preachers or ministers of private congregations, who were by the Act disqualified for any parochial settlement. If to these be added the thirty-five previously displaced, the total number of ministers ejected or silenced within the metropolitan area will amount to 121.'' A few of these were, no doubt, men of slender abilities and defective education, while about the antecedents of others information is lacking ; but at least sixty-three are known to have had a university education, twenty-one of them being graduates of Cambridge, nineteen of Oxford, and eight of other or uncertain universities ; while eight certainly studied at Cambridge and seven at Oxford who are not known to have taken a degree." '" Stat. 13 Chas. II (2), cap. I. " Cardwell, Conferences, 369-91. "Sylvester, Reliquiae Baxterianae, 241-356. "Burnet, Own Time (ed. 1823), i, 312-16. "Stat. 13 & 14 Chas. II, cap. 4. "Kennett, Chron. 753. '^ Calamy, op. cit. ; Palmer, Nonconformists' Memorial, passim. "The most eminent of the ministers ejected or silenced in London were the following: — S. Annesley, LL.D., St. Giles' Cripplegate ; Jos. Car}l, M.A., St. Magnus ; Thos. Case, M.A., St. Giles in the Fields ; Nath. Homes, D.D., St. Mary's St.iining ; Thos. Jacomb, D.D., St. Martin's Ludgate ; Thos. Manton, D.D., St. Paul's Covent Garden ; Philip Nye, M.A., St. Bartholomew Exchange ; Thos. 'incent, M.A., St. Mary Magdalen Milk Street ; (all these were of Oxford) ; Wm. Bates, D.D., St. Dunstan's in the West ; Samuel